The Lorain County Commissioners agreed Wednesday to stop the service that runs downtown effective Aug. 16. The county has been unable to gather the amount of riders it was hoping to get. Starting in September last year, the Cleveland route was implemented as a trial run.

Since its start, the county has spent about $46,000 on the route, according to Pam Novak, Lorain County Transit chief finance officer.

Recently, the commissioners have considered a route on the west side of Lorain, a route that was cut because of lack of funds. But the commissioners decided to cancel the Cleveland route for now and wait to discuss what to do with transit next.

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Novak presented an option with the west side route to connect to a route that would take riders to Oberlin. But the commissioners would like more numbers on the route that connects to Oberlin before they make any more decisions on transit.

Though the commissioners agreed to stop the downtown run, both Lori Kokoski and Tom Williams voiced support for it.

"I'm in favor of keeping it in Lorain County for now," Kokoski said. "There's more need out there (Lorain County) than we probably know."

Commissioner Ted Kalo said that the county should not continue the route that goes downtown.

"The Cleveland route going downtown didn't work, we didn't have the ridership," he said.

Kalo has favored an option of driving to the Westlake Park-n-Ride. The fare there would be $2.50. There also would be a free transfer from LCT to RTA's Red Line and a free transfer from RTA to LCT's Cleveland commuter bus.

The county has been under the microscope of the Federal Transit Authority, Lorain County Administrator Jim Cordes said.

"If we don't do better, we're not going to be doing anything at all," Cordes said. "We need community support."

The FTA has asked Lorain County for an overall picture of the county's transit and its transit-related facilities, Cordes has said.

"The inquiries coming in (from FTA) have been significant and more pressing," he told the board.

On Wednesday, the county was ordered to return five buses back to the FTA. There are still about five new buses in storage that have been there since 2009, Williams said.

He has said that he would like the west side route to work, but believes the county should save money before it can start any new route.

"I know there's a need for it (transit) in the county, but I think we need to wait until the November ballot to see what else we can do with the transit," Williams said.

Meanwhile, the commissioners will have two public hearings to discuss an option to put a sales tax, a 0.25 or a 0.5, on the November ballot. The commissioners passed four resolutions Wednesday regarding a possible sales tax.

If county voters were to pass the sales tax in November, the county would suspend the levies for the Lorain County Crime/Drug Lab, Lorain County 911, the Lorain County Drug Task Force and the Mercy TB Clinic. Those entities would be funded with the sales tax, which goes into the general fund.

Williams said that he encourages residents to come to the public hearings. A resolution will be passed at the next board meeting, at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday. The public hearing on the sales tax will start at 9:45 a.m. The commissioners will then have a night meeting at 5:30 p.m. July 24 with a public hearing on the sales tax at 5:45 p.m. The commissioners will then vote.

The county has $50 million for the 2014 budget. About $56.4 million is being requested in budgets.

According to Cordes, the three levies would bring in $3.3 million dollars. If the county were to put a 0.25 percent sales tax on the levy, it would bring in $7 million to $7.5 million a year, Williams said. He added that if they pass the sales tax, they would waive the collection of property taxes in 2014. The county would then have to put an elimination of the levies on the November 2014 ballot.

Williams said that the courts and judges are ordering that their budgets be $3 million more from their 2013 budget. He added that the commissioners said that it's a separate branch of government which allows the system to order their budget of any amount.

The only option would be to sue the courts, but that wouldn't be an option, the county would take, Williams said.

"It would be a whole mess; other counties have tried it and they've failed."